AstraZeneca announces collaboration and investment agreement with Cellectis to accelerate cell therapy and genomic medicine ambitions

AstraZeneca announced a collaboration and investment agreement with Cellectis, a clinical-stage biotechnology company, to accelerate the development of next generation therapeutics in areas of high unmet need, including oncology, immunology and rare diseases.

Under the terms of the collaboration agreement, AstraZeneca will leverage the Cellectis proprietary gene editing technologies and manufacturing capabilities, to design novel cell and gene therapy products, strengthening AstraZeneca’s growing offering in this space. As part of the agreement, 25 genetic targets have been exclusively reserved for AstraZeneca, from which up to 10 candidate products could be explored for development.

Marc Dunoyer, Chief Strategy Officer, AstraZeneca, and Chief Executive Officer, Alexion, AstraZeneca Rare Disease, said: “The differentiated capabilities Cellectis has in gene editing and manufacturing complement our in-house expertise and investments made in the past year. AstraZeneca continues to advance our ambition in cell therapy for oncology and autoimmune diseases as well as in genomic medicine, which has potential to be transformative for patients with rare diseases.”

André Choulika, PhD, Chief Executive Officer of Cellectis, said: “We believe AstraZeneca is the perfect match to Cellectis by providing world-class expertise in the development and the commercialisation of innovative medicines. This collaboration will allow us to leverage our pioneering research in gene editing and cell therapies, as well as our cutting-edge capabilities in manufacturing with the ambition to bring potentially life-saving therapies to patients with unmet medical need.”

Building on AstraZeneca’s own expertise in cell and genomic therapy, the Company has enhanced its capabilities through several collaborations and investments in the past year as part of its ambition to bring cell therapies to more patients living with cancer and to advance genomic medicines for rare diseases.